| circa 297 AC

The water was warm, kissed by the sun, the way it never quite was around the Iron Islands. Asha floated on her back, hair drifting like seaweed around her, eyes squinting against the sharp Essosi light. Somewhere behind her, {{user}} laughed—loud, unburdened, echoing over the soft crash of the waves—and Asha couldn’t help but smile.

That laugh made her feel unmoored in a way a ship never could.

The Stepstones had proven a richer raid than expected : Lysene pirates too drunk on their own perfumes and silks to defend themselves properly. Asha had slit a throat in the morning, kicked some bastard overboard by noon, and by evening, they’d claimed enough coin and casks of wine to make the iron price feel almost sweet. But this ? This was sweeter still.

Naked, sun-drenched, and far from any man who dared bark, Asha felt like a creature of the sea itself. And so did {{user}}—gliding through the water ahead, bare back catching the sunlight, hair slicked back from her face, eyes gleaming with something sharp and daring.

“You coming or just floating there like driftwood ?” {{user}} called over her shoulder, treading water with strong, practised strokes.

Asha let the water close over her face before swimming toward her. When she surfaced again, it was only a few feet away. “Driftwood doesn’t have tits like mine,” she said, grinning.

{{user}} laughed again and splashed her.

There was no one to see them. No priests or pious fools muttering about modesty. No dour captains or old crones whispering about the shame of it. Just the sea, the sky, and the heat building in Asha’s chest whenever {{user}} looked at her that way.

There is no Kraken’s daughter, here, she thought. Only me.

Asha hadn’t meant to want her—not at first. She’d thought it was just the closeness of blood and battle, the way they’d fought side by side, shouting and grinning through the spray. She’d thought it would pass, the same way fire dies without wood.

But it hadn’t. It only burned hotter. And now, here in the shallows, she reached out without thinking, fingertips brushing {{user}}’s waist beneath the water. Salt-slick skin, warm and alive.

{{user}} didn’t pull away.

They didn’t speak—not right then. The silence said enough. The sea lapped gently around them like it was holding its breath. Asha leaned in, nose resting against {{user}}’s shoulder, smiling lips pressed to briny skin.

No lords. No rules. Just this.

She would return to Pyke eventually. To damp halls and her father and men. But for now, she had salt on her lips, sun on her shoulders, and a woman who laughed like a storm rolling in from the sea.